Is The Church Obsessed with Sex?

No, though sometimes yes.

A substantial batch of paperwork has been released by the CofE in advance of February's General Synod meeting. Apart from some proposals to end so-called 'paupers funerals', most of them have been ignored by the main media outlets. It is only on the comparatively rare occasions when the CofE mention sex that the media beast wakes up and howls at the moon. .

So, inevitably, one document has generated more electronic newsprint than all the rest put together. And you can guess what it's about.  It's a so-called 'Pastoral Statement' about civil partnerships. I say so-called, because the general opinion is that it's not very pastoral, and because it's actually more of a clarification of the status of civil partnerships vis a vis marriage. Civil partnerships are now almost legally indistinguishable from marriage, so the statement addresses how far church teaching on marriage applies to civil partnerships. It's quite clear from the introduction to the document that this is its purpose.

What has caused most of the upset, as far as I can see, is that the document restates the traditional teaching of the church on marriage, in pretty much the same terms as it stated it 15 years ago. So whilst CofE leaders are talking about 'radical inclusion' and the church as a whole is following a 'listening process', the document strikes a different tone to all of that. It's not hard to see how that creates a dissonance, it looks to those who want the church to change its teaching that all this chat about inclusion and listening is just smoke and mirrors, and that nothing has changed, or will change.

There's plenty about this going on elsewhere - see Ian Pauls comments section for example - but for what it's worth....

1. The media is obsessed with sex, not the church. Westboro Baptist Church has a membership of 50, and yet is the subject of countless articles, documentaries, TV programmes, chat show discussions etc. Why? Because of their attitude to sex and how they express it. Don't give them the oxygen of publicity. My two churches have a combined membership 3x the size of Westboro, we have no placards, and we're still waiting for that call from Louis Theroux.

2. This is what happens when a body trying to communicate with its own members ends up speaking to everyone.

Christian discipleship includes a form of discipline (the clue's in the noun), just like commitment to any other path, be it losing weight, learning a skill or doing a paid job. What applies to Christians doesn't apply to people who aren't Christians. I don't follow the rules or practices of Weight Watchers, or the Labour Party, but members of both have certain rules and values they're supposed to abide by.  I shouldn't be scandalised if Weight Watches raises its weight loss target by 50%, or cancels the membership of people who don't turn up to meetings - I'm not a member of the group, it's nothing to do with me. It may be wise for me to act a bit more like a member of Weight Watchers (no comment), but that's as far as it goes. It may be wise for people to act a bit more like some of the things the church commends (forgiveness, generosity etc.) but that's as far as it goes. The rules, teaching and values of a group apply in full to group members only. But the rules, teaching and values of the CofE seem to be everyone's property. The signatories to the letter of protest at the Bishops statement go way beyond church members.

3. As someone who didn't have sex before I got married - and have never regretted that - I'm not sure how I would feel if my church declared that that was all a mistake, and I needn't have bothered with all that restraint nonsense. It was challenging, difficult,, and went against the flow of the culture I was raised in - raise that by a factor of 10 for the present day. I'm glad I did it, and would encourage others to do the same, even though most of the couples I do weddings for already have kids, and nearly all of them are living together. I pray God would bless them and give them fantastic marriages, and am delighted for all of them that they've found love in each other. Yet it would still be a massive kick in the guts if the CofE decided that (somehow) sex and marriage didn't belong together, and decoupled the ultimate act of commitment and the ultimate act of loving vulnerability. There are those of us for whom the CofE's 'definition of marriage' is how we have faithfully tried to live out our following of Jesus, it isn't something we need to apologise for.

4. Just as the 'settled results of modern scholarship' look like laughable guff a couple of generations later, we have not reached a settled shared morality on sexuality as a society. Far from it. Would you look at our rates of porn use (especially among children) sexual violence, relationship breakup, gender confusion (the Tavistock centre is now being sued for its gender transition practices by someone who experienced them as a child), the high pitched tone of all debates around gender sex and ethics, rising incidence of STDs, etc and think: 'they've really got all this sussed, if any society has got a mature and well considered take on sexuality its the UK in 2020'? That doesn't mean coming to no conclusions at all, but it does mean we need to hold our conclusions in a proper spirit of liberalism, rather than absolute conviction that we are right, and everyone else is wicked.

Broken News: Hey, Media, Leave Them Heads Alone

ITV are dangling some outrage bait this morning with another story based on a school newsletter. This follows a nearby school last week which hit first the local, then the national papers, and a story about pyjama-wearing parents at a school in the North-East. All 3 stories were based on newsletters for parents, sent home with children.

As a parent, communication with the school is key, in both directions. It would be a real problem if the school didn't feel it could talk honestly with me about our children, and the life of the school. Headteachers around the country will be looking at this latest media bandwagon and wondering if it's still possible to communicate with parents, without their words ending up quoted in the Daily Mail and fed to the social media outrage machine.

Parents with an issue over what a school has said need to take it up with the school, not leak it to the press. Using the media to settle scores undermines the parent-school relationship for everyone. School newsletters are for the school community, they are not press releases. If there is a serious problem, then there are proper channels to go through.

Local media have a responsibility here too - in the short term, you might get a bit more web traffic, but at what cost? Not every attention-grabbing headline needs to be published. It clearly suits ITV to sex the story up: head 'demands' - really? 'apparent bid to boost attendance' - nudge nudge! Conflict generates clicks, harmony doesn't. But web traffic and sales data aren't a reliable moral compass.

And for any complaint, Jesus has some good advice: “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ 'School and Parent work together' won't make any headlines in your local paper (more's the pity), but then that's not the point is it?

New story, old url: the Telegraph and the Bishop of Greater London

May the Farce Be With You: there was a brief flutter this morning over a Telegraph story headlined 'Bishops Condemn CofE over Cinema Advert'.

If you visit the story now, you'll see that the headline and article have completely changed, but the url hasn't. The Bishops in question in the original (you only need 2 to make a plural) were Steven Croft, Bishop of Sheffield, who wasn't criticising the CofE at all (which the new article recognises), and the 'Bishop of Greater London', who is nothing to do with the Church of England, Here's a bit about his 'Open Episcopal Church', though his work seems to be as more of a freelance celebrant and campaigner. He doesn't seem that keen on the Lords Prayer either, which is odd for a bishop.

Credit to the Telegraph for correcting the story, but not much for posting it in the first place. It almost looked like an informal competition with the Sun for most misleading headline of the week.

The whole business does raise the interesting question of DIY clergy titles. What other clergy with impressive titles are lurking out there, waiting to be uncovered? If the CofE missed Greater London, what other parts of the UK could be ripe for episcopal/ceremonial recognition? It could be quite a lucrative trade, the ecclesiastical equivalent of personalised number plates. Canon Precentor of Marks and Spencer? Pioneer Archdeacon of Helvellyn? The Baby-Eating Bishop of Bath and Wells could be a proper title at last, with the added bonus of getting quoted by national newspapers looking for a headline.

Don't Read All About It

Christians need to exercise a healthy scepticism towards the mainstream media, and find alternative sources of news alongside it. That seems to be the lesson of the last 7 days. If you're a newly elected political leader, you can expect more scepticism towards your faith than towards your politics, and if Jesus does play any part in your life, don't bother mentioning it to a journalist because they'll leave that bit out anyway. One high profile BBC broadcaster notes that 'it's almost socially unacceptable to say that you believe in God'

A sensible approach might be to assume, even if it seems unkind, that every worldview is worthy of suspicion and scrutiny, and that it’s not just some chap in the Lib Dems talking to someone who may or may not exist in the sky who should be grilled about his fundamental assumptions, but everyone who expresses an interest in making big decisions on voters’ behalf. Yes, we should be suspicious of Tim Farron’s Christian worldview – but only in so far as we suspect everyone’s funny jumble of beliefs and assumptions.

Reasonable (mostly) words at the Spectator, but just look at the headline it's been given. 

What's the message? Keep quiet about your Christian faith. If you don't, and it's something positive, it won't be reported anyway, either that or we'll use it as a stick to beat you with. Welcome to a 'free' media. 

So, head for the bunkers? No, the suspicion and misunderstanding faced by the first century Christians was several orders of magnitude worse than anything in the UK at the moment. And what is the advice of their main leader? "Always be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that is in you, but do it with gentleness and respect." (1 Peter 3) We still need to be PG certificate Christians, Prepared, Gentle, and suitable for a general audience. And meanwhile, pray for Tim Farron, who has suddenly become one of the most high profile Christians in the country. 

Anthropocene or Neanderthal? Murdoch signals the end of an era

A few days ago, some geologists announced that we were living in a new global epoch, the Anthropocene Age. It turns out that the first nuclear tests marked the beginning of this new phase of global history, up there with the Triassic, the Cretaceous and the Audacious.

It turns out they had got slightly ahead of themselves. We are actually in the final few days of the Neanderthal Period, with the news that the Sun is about to stop publishing pictures of breasts on page 3.

However, there are signs that we may be simply entering the Dacre Age: most of the papers reporting on the Sun story are themselves putting up lots of pictures of women in bikinis, because their readers clearly need to be reminded what a woman in a bikini looks like.

 #Fail.

This has been standard Daily Mail practice for years - x is so outrageous we have to show you a picture of it, just so you know how outrageous it is (wink wink).

Congratulations to the No More Page 3 campaign, even the Mighty Murdoch can be forced to change by people power. Now for Stop the Sidebar?


update: having said all that, the Neanderthals may not have quite given up yet...

Andy Hawthorne/Stephen Nolan interview: an inspiring 26 minutes of radio

If you've not heard Stephen Nolans recent 5 Live interview with Andy Hawthorne of the Message trust, then listen to it here. Brilliant. Nolan isn't a Christian by any definition, but he's clearly struck by both Andy's story, and who he is:

"There's something thats kind of drawing me to the expression on your face, you've got this radiance about you, this exuberance, this happiness about you, I'm just intrigued as to what this is all about..."

"Even if (you're deluding yourself) you're getting a contentment and joy that non-believers don't have."

"I've desperately wanted to believe in God for a very long time, but I don't want to bluff myself."

Hawthorne is completely up front about his faith, and I would love to be 30 years into ministry and still have the passion and enthusiasm that he's got.

Party Political Broadcasts: For Goodness Sake Grow Up

This is the Labour election broadcast for the local and Euro elections. Who on earth thought this was a good idea? It looks like an overlong sketch from Armstrong and Miller that was cut from the final show for not being funny. Dreadful. 

The Libdem effort, thrown together yesterday and circulated online in response, is slightly better. Well, it's shorter anyway.



There appears to be a conspiracy to make UKIP look like a serious political party, with, what are they called, oh yes, POLICIES.

Grow up, the lot of you. Speaking of which, here's the Greens, which is much, much better, whatever your take on how realistic the proposals are:



compare and contrast the UKIP manifesto, which aside from wanting to cut foreign aid and scrap green energy, has some odd mathematical brains working on it. Lower council tax doesn't go together with more regular bin collections, keeping more libraries open, mending pot holes, cheaper bus services and free parking. And if you cut immigration there will be cuts to NHS services, unless there's a concerted attempt to crack down on the squandering of medical training and resources on vanity surgery. It doesn't add up.

But at least the manifesto bears some relationship to the election itself, so full marks to them for that.

It must be Easter, or maybe Christmas

The signs are everywhere, a 'gospel of Jesus wife' which even the promoters admit was written at least 300 years after the life of Jesus, and one person who thinks the Gospel of Luke was written by Mary (well, actually, he doesn't - the Daily Fail thinks this makes a good headline, the GP/bible scholar in question repeats a fairly mainstream view; that Luke gathered evidence from various sources and then put it into a coherent order. Mary, Jesus mother, was one of the sources. That's not the same as saying she wrote the gospel. When you get to looking at what Dr Bradford actually says, there's not much there to fundamentally disagree with).

It must be Easter. Or maybe Christmas.

There's an unofficial publishing season for these stories, which begins roughly 15 days before any major Christian festival, after which nobody really gives a monkeys.

I love the 'facts' in the Mail article - Luke has double the number of feminine words than Mark? Well for a start his gospel is nearly twice as long, and he has more stories about women.

Perhaps we need to add in a Biblical Ignorance Day on the Tuesday before Palm Sunday, when all these things can be paraded, hyped up, the foundations of Christendom can be shaken to the core, and then we can all safely forget about them until the following year.

Random Jottings: Bishops, Bad Weather, Baptism and Byyyy Eck Lad

Wells MP Tessa Munt has written (presumably at taxpayers expense) to the CofE to ask why the Bishop of Bath and Wells will no longer live in the Bishops Palace. "One of the charms of the palace was the possibility that one might just run into the bishop or his wonderful wife in the grounds, and in my view, it is a great shame that the chances of being blessed in this way are reduced almost to nothing. Unless Ms Munt is happy for her constituents to wander around her front garden on the off chance that they might bump into her, I really can't see what the problem is. The Palace will remain, the Bishop will still work there, it will still be open to visitors. And the Diocese will benefit from having a bishop who can get some proper time off, rather than living over the shop trying to avoid politicians.

The Sun once again shows its contempt for ordinary people. I don't imagine its much fun living in Mulcheney at the moment, using it as a backdrop for a cheap publicity stunt is pretty dire. Maybe they'll be sending a page 3 girl to a Syrian refugee camp to cheer people up there? I'm sure that'd work a treat.

In other weather related news. Hell has frozen over. I guess a lot of other stuff will happen now.

Delighted to find out I'm still a Northerner, even though I've now been in Somerset longer than I lived in Yorkshire.

I've been trying to avoid getting too far into the kerfuffle over the provisional, experimental, temporary baptism prayers: various links to opinions here, and this is a good piece. And this is the only revision that would be acceptable to the Daily Mail.

Was really encouraged by this, the amazing diversity of God's church in the UK. And here's an article on our little corner of it, due in the local paper tomorrow, weather permitting.

In case you missed it, Dave Walkers cartoon advent calendar kept me amused for most of December, and it sees him restored to rightful prominence in the Ebuzzing blog list.

If you're looking for some new blogs to browse for 2014, The Church Sofa has some suggestions. I'd want to add the excellent Cookies Days, which along with Quarentia was my most fruitful source for good links and inspiration last year.

Daily Mail resources

How Much Are You Hated by the Daily Mail? I'm loathed, apparently. I'll leave you to guess why.

The website Should I Read the Daily Mail is in-depth, interactive, and indispensable.

Such a shame therefore that a few days ago they published a really important piece by a former editor of Loaded on the impact of pornography on teenagers and their views on sex and self-image. So, do I link to it, at the same time linking to a sidebar of bikinis and cleavage photos which has precisely the opposite message to the article?

I guess if this is the biggest dilemma in my life at the moment I should just be thankful.

Pornography: straws in the wind?

Following last weeks government announcement about a default block on online pornography, quickly followed by Microsoft suddenly discovering that they could make more difficult for certain sorts of web users, comes a third straw in the wind.

Co-op supermarkets have given lads mags a deadline of 9th September to introduce 'modesty bags' or be withdrawn from sale. Apparently the Daily Sport has already agreed to this - at our local Co-op, it's displayed at the eye level of an average 10 year old.

Steve Murrells, retail chief executive for the Co-operative Group, said: "As a community-based retailer, we have listened to the concerns of our customers and members, many of whom say they object to their children being able to see overt sexual images in our stores.

"Whilst we have tried to mitigate the likelihood of young children seeing the images with a number of measures in store, the most effective way of doing this is for these magazines to be put in individual, sealed modesty bags."

Well, no, the most effective way is not to stock them at all, the way you currently don't stock other pornographic titles. The local Tesco Express, which has all the papers at floor level, doesn't sell the Sport, though the lads mags are within easy reach/sight of the Year 6 kids from the local primary school. 

With 'No More Page 3' gaining signatories and influence, there are a few signs of hope that the tide of pornification is turning. But there's a long way to go, and vast swathes of the entertainment and fashion industries still defiantly waving Beyonce's booty at any notions of modesty, sexual purity, and respect for women as people rather than sexual objects.

Church of England Headline generator

Superb bit of work from Archdruid Eileen at the Beaker Folk, now you don't need to read the Telegraph or the Mail.

Leveson on press sexism and soft porn

Update: several dozen MPs have written to the Sun to call for page 3 to be scrapped, as part of the ongoing #nomorepage3 campaign. The Sun are resisting, because they know sex sells. 

Here's a few snippets from the Leveson report, which devotes a section to how women are portrayed in the press (vol 2, p660 ff).

the unfortunate juxtaposition of the article expressing outrage at a satirical programme on paedophilia and an article commenting on a 15 year-old’s breasts exposes a hypocrisy in relation to the sexualisation of young girls and women that is seen beyond the Page 3 tabloids: some have commented on the awkward co-existence of the Daily Mail’s support for “traditional values” with the Mail Online’s “sidebar of shame”. (p663)

The evidence as a whole suggested that there is force in the trenchant views expressed by the groups and organisations who testified to the Inquiry that the Page 3 tabloid press often failed to show consistent respect for the dignity and equality of women generally, and that there was a tendency to sexualise and demean women (p664)

The impact of discriminatory or prejudicial representations of women in the Page 3 tabloids is difficult to  judge. There is credible evidence that it has a broader impact on the perception and role of women in society, and the sexualisation of society generally

these are important and sensitive issues which merit further consideration by any new regulator. What is clearly required is that any such regulator has the power to take complaints from representative women’s groups.  Consideration should also be given to Code amendments which, while protecting freedom of speech and the freedom of the press, would equip that body with the power to intervene in cases of allegedly discriminatory reporting and in so doing reflect the spirit of equalities legislation.

The fleet street trinity of sexism, soft porn and stereotypes are alive and well, and are explored further in this BBC piece. For a particularly rancid example, here's a dreadful Mail article about a vicar who (shock) wore some 'fashionable' clothes, cut and pasted from a piece in the Times at the weekend, plus half an hour reading Twitter, with the usual (my apologies) set of bikini shots in the sidebar, which tells you all you need to know about how the Mail sees women.  Too Liberal nails it.

So if there's any prospect of a regulator who can challenge this kind of garbage, and a change of culture in the press towards treating women as women and not as pieces of meat, then bring it on.

No More Page 3

I've signed this petition, which asks the editor of the Sun to stop putting pictures of naked women on page 3.

you shouldn’t show the naked breasts of young women in your widely read ‘family’ newspaper.

Consider this a long overdue outcry.

Dominic, stop showing topless pictures of young women in Britain’s most widely read newspaper, stop conditioning your readers to view women as sex objects.

Enough is enough.

Thank you.

The 'No More Page 3' campaign also has a Facebook and Twitter presence. Lucy Ann Holmes explains her reasons for starting the petition here, though why the Independent felt they needed to use that particular picture..... well, it just proves her point.

Holmes writes: The page 3 girl image is there for no other reason than the sexual gratification of men. She’s a sex object. But when figures range from 300,000 women being sexually assaulted and 60,000 raped each year, to 1 in 4 who have been sexually assaulted, is it wise to be repeatedly perpetuating a notion that women are sexual objects?

or in the words of the late lamented Somerset band 'Why?'
Naked woman on page 3
Page 4 the story of a sex offender
Somewhere down the line we miss the point....

The campaign is now asking major supermarkets to boycott the Sun until it discontinues the practice.

It's very difficult in 2012, unless you have very poor eyesight, to keep to Jesus teaching: "anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Culture is riddled with the message that women are sex objects, from page 3 to pole dancing being marketed as exercise. I'm reminded of Douglas Couplands observation that marketing is feeding our own waste back to us in such a way that we don't realise it's real food (he uses stronger language than that). Fashion, music videos, magazine covers, you name it, there are plenty of things out there which make it difficult for men who want to keep their thought life pure.

Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a life. Holmes is right, what we sow in a tabloid photo we reap in misery.

The gospel according to Star Trek

Over at the Transpositions blog is a recent series on Star Trek and the Christian faith. Avid Trekkies will understand more of it than I do, but if you're interested in whether Spock is a Christ figure, and how the humanism of Star Trek challenges and converses with the gospel, then it might be worth a peek. 

I've long wondered if, in the absence of a shared public faith, the genre of science fiction and fantasy is the easiest place for us to process our spiritual ideas. (We use soap operas to process morality.) The Force, Neo, the end of the world in its various forms (End of Days, The Day After Tomorrow, Armageddon), Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, are all stuffed full of common religious themes, many overtly Christian, but take them in different directions. Recent Doctor Who's have a clunky 'Daleks as fundamentalists' subplot, making the most destructive and vicious creatures in the universe also the most religious. And there's those 'angels': maybe a more avid sci-fi fan than myself can blog on whether Doctor Who carries on where Star Trek left off.

RE:THINK BBC religion and ethics conference: can God be slotted?

The BBC are hosting a religion and ethics conference later this week, featuring Richard Dawkins, Jonathan Sacks, and a range of seminars and talks on ethical and religious topics. Looks fascinating, and there's a good interview with the new(ish) head of Religon and Ethics here. Aquil Ahmed will be debating the 'God slot' on Wednesday, and had this to say in the interview:

He will make it clear that he wants the corporation’s religious programmes to appeal to as broad an audience as possible, including atheists.

While he will retain traditional religious programmes such as Songs of Praise, he will increasingly commission shows that deal with faith in broader contexts, such as Dead Good Job, an observational series starting this week about the work of undertakers across different religious communities and people no faith.

He said: “When we say 'rethinking the God slot’, it is to say there’s probably a lot more religion on television than people realise, it’s just not classed in the old-fashioned sense as, 'it is at this time, therefore it’s a God slot kind of programme’.

“The old fashioned concept of, 'it’s Sunday, it’s this time of day, every channel has got some kind of programme about Christianity’...those days are gone.

“People are fascinated by religion and you don’t have to know that you’re watching a specific programme about religion.”

The whole idea of a God slot is nonsense anyway, God doesn't fit into a slot, everything else slots into God. To confine spiritual content to Songs of Praise and Thought for the Day has an implicit dualism. I guess Christians have wanted to protect these 'slots' because they feared that, without them, God would disappear completely from the airwaves.

Far from it: when things have calmed down a bit there's probably a dissertation to be written on religious symbolism and content in the Olympic ceremonies, from the hymns in the Olympic opening event, to the overt pagan symbolism in the closing ceremony yesterday. The BBC conference itself suggest that, the less religious we get as a nation, the more we want to think about religion. It's a time of flux, it's not just the goalposts that are moving but all the pitch markings too. So we can expect plenty more debate about where the lines should eventually fall.

Ebuzzing rankings for September (i.e. August), and other stuff

Until Ebuzzing fix their data collection I'm not going to do any more full run-downs, but if you're interested in exploring other blogs, or in where you are in the blog pickers top 20, the latest Ebuzzing rankings for Religion and Belief are out. Mildly amused that the top 2 are an atheist blog, and a Christian apologetics blog, I wonder if they communicate with each other. Also good to see Lay Anglicana in the top 10 for the first time.

In other list news, the Church of England is now doing a daily rundown of media coverage, well done to Arun Arora, new Head of Comms, for setting this up. It would be good to have a 'subscribe' button but hopefully that's on the way.

If that's got you all too excited, there's also a press release on the next bishops gathering to tie themselves in knots over women bishops. Anyone who can read this at one sitting and understand it has been spending too much time in WATCH meetings. Actually I think the best thing for now would be for the various pressure groups to observe a public vow of silence until the end of the year, so that we can work this out as Christians rather than as lobbyists.

CofE Disinvests from Newscorp

Andrew Brown, Secretary of the Church Commissioners, said: "Last year's phone hacking allegations raised some serious concerns amongst the Church's investing bodies about our holding in News Corporation. Our decision to disinvest was not one taken lightly and follows a year of continuous dialogue with the company, during which the EIAG (ethical advisory group) put forward a number of recommendations around how corporate governance structures at News Corporation could be improved. However the EIAG does not feel that the company has brought about sufficient change and we have accepted its advice to disinvest."


more here. I doubt this will extend to advice to clergy to stop buying the Times or the Sun, though that would be thorougly consistent. Drat, I really like the Times' puzzle page.

Media Relations for Ministers 101/Grumbling

Another corker from Cake or Death. Reminded of it by yesterdays story on government plans to put a King James Bible into every school. I first read about it on the BBC site, but knew before I reached the relevant section that they'd have a quote from the National Secular Society opposing the project. So I left that link off and majored on some of the positive things being done in schools instead.

By 'coincidence', I skimmed the ABofC's 2011 Lent book yesterday, and was particularly struck by a chapter on 'Giving up Grumbling'. The automatic reaction of the media is to seek out the 'grumble' angle on any story. Conflict spices the story up a bit, but it also becomes almost impossible to celebrate anything with out a 'yes but.....' Living in that atmosphere isn't great for the soul.

CS Lewis put it like this:  "Hell begins with a grumbling mood, always complaining, always blaming others... but you are still distinct from it. You may even criticize it in yourself and wish you could stop it. But there may come a day when you can no longer. Then there will be no you left to criticize the mood or even to enjoy it, but just the grumble itself, going on forever like a machine. It is not a question of God "sending us" to hell. In each of us there is something growing, which will BE hell unless it is nipped in the bud. ”

The media as the outer circle of hell? Or am I grumbling?

Should the Media be the Medium? How the CofE Talks to Itself

A couple of recent instances:
 - a letter to the Times by various senior clergy calling for the church's understanding of marriage to change to include same-sex couples.
 - a front page in our local paper a few weeks ago, which then was picked up by several national papers, on a dispute in the local church.

A question:
 - is the media, local or national, the place to have our debates within the Church of England?

In the local case, I don't get the sense that there was an attempt to stimulate debate, and the way it was reported was very adversarial. All the piece did was made any possibility of resolution impossible, whilst inflicting a large amount of strain and anguish on the parish concerned. In the national case, given that the House of Bishops is having another look at its position on sexuality, where do these debates happen - on the floor of Synod, via the letter pages of secular newspapers, or face to face?

I'm aware of the irony of asking this question on a blog which, at times, has tried to engage in debates about the CofE via the blogosphere rather than via the institutions the church has for discussions and governance.

My strongest thought is this: the media should be neither the first port of call, nor the last. It shouldn't be the first place we go with an opinion, we should be able to talk to each other first. And it shouldn't be the last place we go, because we've lost the argument and we want to go down with as much noise and collateral damage as possible.